Comments on: Are you kidding me? My take on Christian Conferences.

By: daronnwashington

daronnwashington — Sun, 07 Sep 2008 12:53:35 +0000

Whether a person goes to a church help conference or not I think basically depends on them. Every conference basically has it’s price. Some more extreme then others. But the individual has to evaluate if it is worth paying the price to attend.

During the time of Jesus people traveled from all over to come and hear him. Granted they did not pay an entry fee but I do think it is Biblical. If we think that it will help us why not? Yes it is true that people all over the world have good works and do not go to conferences. But the question is if they could would they? I think any respective ministry that is looking to do their best for God is open to the idea that they do not know everything and seek outside of their immediate surroundings to learn.

I completely agree in the abstince of the motivational seminar approach but don’t agree with throwing out the baby with the bath water.

Thanks for the post.

By: James Dalman

James Dalman — Tue, 25 Mar 2008 19:40:15 +0000

@ Wil – Thanks for the feedback! I think there can be a huge concentration on “doing church” as we would a business and this is can lead to problems in the church. Learning from businesses and even conferences isn’t wrong; it’s when we place our trust more in the way of men than the way of Jesus. I guess the main reason for my post was that I am upset at how many church leaders (from big and small churches) seem to do this…elevating people who have “made it” to a god-like status.

@ Eddie – Please know it’s not anything with HPC and I think this may have come across as throwing a stone at them. My post has to do with conferences in general and the attitude (as stated above) that some church peeps get by idolizing the presenters, the methods, or the technology. I have no beef against any of these conferences from a personal stand point. I just pray that more Christians would follow Jesus and not the church rock stars. Maybe I’ll drop in some day – as long as no one body slams me! LOL.

By: Eddie

Eddie — Sat, 22 Mar 2008 21:26:56 +0000

Hey man,

I only skimmed over the article and some of the feed back yuo recieved. I just want to say sorry for all of the negitave feed back and that I attend HPC. By no way have we mastered ministry or anything else. We constantly visit other Churches to see how they do ministry. And to see the effectiveness of what they do.

I just want to ask one question. Have you ever attended a HPC service? If not you should come check us out!

By: wil dunbar

wil dunbar — Fri, 21 Mar 2008 19:51:06 +0000

I have enjoyed reading your thoughts on church conferences as well as the replies to your post. I think one of your replies touches on the issue but not stongly enough when he indicts the christian church culture of today of embracing the business model as a viable means to “doing church”. I have had experience with many who feel that this model is THE way to build a church community and have adopted similar practices to do so. This leads to “success” in terms of numbers, fundraising, resources but leaves the congregation in dire need of real connectivity to the church itself unless they are actually a part of the staff. Churches have gone from allowing members to conduct the business of the church to relying on paid staff to accomplish this while being little more than passive participants in the process. Consumerism in churches is so rampant it seems that it is the norm and all else off the mark. These conferences are just symptoms of the true problem as they market to those who buy into this model.